In The Garden — Planning A Garden From Scratch Or Sod
By AMY MUNCY
Advanced Master Gardener
WARSAW — The best time to start a garden project at a site that is sod is the year before. If it is a site with unplanted soil, you can start planning the garden right away.
I am going to start a garden in sod next year around the edge of the new septic. It will be a rather large garden and will also be curved. The lot is a corner lot with a road that curves around its outer edge. This will create some challenges.
The soil is not good and will need to be amended with organic material. I have started a large compost heap that I have covered with a large tarp. Luckily I literally fell into a load of composted horse manure and mixed this with rather rocky top soil and leaves and other green manures. I did not chop the leaves so I will have to wait for the winter to be over before I can use the compost. I will have to stir the entire heap once before it freezes so the leaves will break down faster. I will go into further detail at a later time about composting and the importance of it.
The site will be in full sun almost all day long and will be receiving westerly winds on a slight incline. There is a spot that gets a lot of standing water when it rains so that will need to be addressed with looking into the correct plants for that area. I will be moving the garden up the slope more in this area. Possibly on top. Yet, I will still need to be aware of the septic area.
Weather does matter a great deal when deciding a garden. Have you ever noticed a new tree that seems tilted, or burnt/wilted leaves of plants that can’t handle standing water, a lot of wind or to much sun? The trees that seem to tilt are usually planted incorrectly and/or the ground is too soft, too wet and the wind allowed the root ball to shift in the soil before its roots got a good hold. So a combination of weather in relation to plants should always be considered when choosing a new garden site.
Fruit trees should be researched for what type of site is best for them. My experience has been to keep frost and severe wind damage at a lesser risk, plant most fruit trees on a south east facing hill near the top or just below the ridge to help keep shear line winds off the trees. If you plant in a valley of hills, cold air and frost seem to go to the lowest points and could possibly kill the flowers of fruit trees if we got a cold snap at that time. I have not decided if I would like a fruit tree in my new garden or not. I may look into a Espalier-grown fruit tree to act as an ornamental feature in the garden.
I will continue with photos and processes of starting this garden in the following articles. If you are starting a garden in the next year, let me know your questions or concerns by emailing me at [email protected].
Amy Muncy was born in Wabash County and lived there for close to 40 years. Muncy grew up in the country, has always enjoyed gardening and mowing the lawn. She has been gardening since a small girl. She moved to Kosciusko County in 2000. She is a master gardener intern at this point, but will be a full master gardener before long.
“I enjoy all aspects of gardening. I really don’t have an expertise on any one thing. I make compost. I can, freeze and dehydrate. I like to grow veggies, flowers, herbs and houseplants. I like to plant trees everywhere I can. I know a little bit about a lot of gardening. I would say most of my experience has been on composting and different ways to do it. I believe we must conserve our land for our future generations and composting is a great way of doing this. The more we become self sufficient, the better off future generations are and we need to be teaching them by example.”